It’s no secret that Russian President Vladimir Putin harbors a deep hatred for koala bears. At only 5 years of age his entire family was mauled to death by a pack of starving koala bears at the Moscow Zoo after they had bravely jumped in to rescue the young dictator.

“It was horrible,” Putin said in a 2012 interview with The Moscow Times. “The bears. They were everywhere. Just a blur of grey. So many in the west think they are cute little creatures. No. They are beasts from hell.”

A young Australian koala bear eyes its prey from a strategic aerial position.

As it turns out Putin is not the only world leader who has issues with animals.

In 2012 Putin underwent heavy scrutiny for bringing his black Labrador Snowflake to a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who is famously scared of dogs. Although he denies the allegations, many speculated that Putin did so as a political tactic to strike fear into Merkel.

“It’s true. I fucking hate Labradors” Merkel told reporters after the meeting. “But the German people will not be held captive by a fear of Russian Labradors.”

British Prime Minister Theresa May is scared of gorillas. China’s Xi Jinping is repulsed by cats, ironically.

Theresa May describes her encounter with an African silverback gorilla at the U.N. Summit in January.

Putin has been accused of paying May’s African tour guide to lead her off trail into a nest of unruly silverbacks during an expedition earlier in the year. So far the allegations remain unsubstantiated.

On the world stage, it seems there’s nobody Putin can’t get to, and his ability to sniff out his political opponents’ fears and exploit them is rivaled only by the likes of Bruce Wayne. More so, he appears to leverage his “nothing to lose” mentality and seeming willingness to escalate conflicts as a deterrent to those who could stand in his way and gains one inch at a time in his quest for power.

According to recently surfaced intelligence reports, Putin may have ran his ultimate fear campaign last summer. Not just against May with the gorilla incident, but also against esteemed Wikileaks editor-in-chief Julian Assange.

The strange disappearance of koala bears across Australia to this date had previously been inexplicable. But in a shocking blow to the political world an MI6 agent over the the weekend leaked to the Pentagon that during his operations in Melbourne last year, he came into contact with multiple Russian expatriates working with local hunters to seize and transport koala bears back to Russia.

Whatever the intentions for smuggling out the bears, it’s very clear that the waning population gave Putin leverage over Assange in his home country.

Assange has had a well-known affinity across the globe for koala bears since he published his 2008 novel, “A Bear’s Life: Stories of Australia’s Most Sensual Creatures.” For six months the Australian journalist lived in the woods with a family of koalas closely studying them and learning their most intimate tribal secrets. Assange has been questioned about his closeness to the koalas during that time. In one excerpt from his novel Assange writes:

“Alone in the woods with these bears night after lonely night, with only the sound of the crickets and howling coyotes, and the desperate void of human contact, one becomes closer. At night, when the bears are snoring, you might snuggle just a little closer. Breathe a little more safely in the comfort of their furry bosoms. You might start to share secrets. Bear secrets.”

Assange of course is still a fugitive on charges of rape in Switzerland. During a 2010 conference in Stockholm he was found black out drunk inside the zoo with a vial of rohypnol in his breast pocket. Police let him out of jail free of charges before zookeepers reported that their treasured koala Suzie had been asleep for three days. Stockholm Zoo security guards released footage of what appeared to be Assange drugging and coercing the half-awake koala bear into an engagement of some sort. Fortunately Suzie was conscious enough to defend herself with a switchblade until the heavily intoxicated Assange passed out.

Footage of Assange and Suzie the koala taken at Stockholm Zoo (2010)

This is where the story takes a slightly bizarre turn.

During the same time President Trump was in Moscow allegedly partaking in “golden shower” fetishes, Assange had been invited for a quiet sit-down with Putin. British intelligence reported that the Russian dictator offered Assange asylum and unlimited visits with the koala bears in exchange for his active participation in hacking the DNC and helping to throw the election in favor of Trump.

There is still speculation on the nature of Trump and Putin’s relationship, why Putin wanted Trump to win so badly, and whether or not Trump also had access to the koala bears or their fur.